It's been monday again and that means gardenphotoday.
We've had soon horrible weather yesterday, it kept raining all. day. long! So no chance to make pictures unfortunately. This one's from this morning.

At this time the plan (I hope I won't change it again but you never know...) is for it to become 2,5 x 1,4 meters. I hade calculated this with my tape measure and notebook in my hands, but only now that I actually see it taking shape I begin to realise just how big that is. It's going to be huge! It will be as wide as a duvet cover, but longer, so that the top and bottom will have as much extra lenght as the sides (or at least that's the theory, right...)

The boy has been asking about his blanket every now and then, but how do you explain to a five-year-old that it will take months to finish.... So I told him it would be ready in the winter. I'm going to have to hurry a bit!

It's finished! My grannystripe scarf !
For the first time since the horrible thing I made in school I actually finished something crocheted and what's more, even wore it already! (and got me some compliments to boot) I'm so very proud!

It didn't turn out exactly the way I intended, since I ran out of 2 of the colors of yarn so I couldn't make it longer, and also I wanted to add an edging, the whole thing ended up much shorter and wider than I wanted. But I still like it a lot, and it's also nice and cosily warm! Ideal for this time of year, when it's just getting too cold to go out without a coat.

September 15, 2010

This garland carries a child's name in felt letters, and also an exchangeble number made of felt, which can be replaced for every birthday. All you need to do is cut out a new felt number representing the child's age.

The first step is to figure out how long you want your garland to become, and what size the flags should be. I wanted my flags to be quite large, so I cut out a cardboard template of about 20 cm wide and 30 cm long.

Use siccors or a circular cutter with a ruler to cut out the triangle. Repeat this step until you have 2 triangles to make 1 flag. Ofcourse it's also possible to fold you fabric over so you can cut out 2 triangles at once. Especially easy to do when you're using a circular cutter.

Now you'll have to calculate how many flags are needed. When you're using a short name, like Max, it may be wise to add some text by repeating the name, or adding something like "Max 4 years". But if the name you're using is, for instance, Martijn and he's turning 6, you may use a flag for each letter (that's 7), 1 for the number, 1 for the space between the name and the number and 2 for the spaces at the beginning and the end, making a total of 11 flags.

For my garland I needed 12 flags, and I liked using a different fabric for each one, all in shades of green. But ofcourse you could also choose to use 2 fabrics in different colors, or whatever you like.

At this point you need to decide how large you want the letters to be. I cut out a template that was about 9 cm wide at the smallest, and about 12 cm high. I needed my letters to fit inside this shape (remembering about half a cm of seam allowance on the sides!)

At first I tried to draw the letters myself, but that turned out to be a lot harder than I thought, so I ended up printing out an extremely large typeface (I think it was 270 pt). Re-check the sizes at this point, make some final adjustments and then cut the letters out of the paper.

Now cut out all your letters and numbers out of felt (don't forget possible repeats at this point). If you want you lettering to be double-sides, cut everything out twice. Then pin your letters to your fabric triangles.

If you want double-sided lettering, the best thing to do at this point is to lay out all your triangles in the order you want them, and then pin all the letters to the right triangles. This way you avoid making mistakes later. (ofcourse I stupidly skipped this step but to clarify here's a little sketch)

On the triangle that is to hold the number, sew a small piece of velcro (the rough side). If you want all letters to be exchangeable, do this for every letter.
Check your felt letter fits onto the velcro, and also check it stays on securely. If it doesn't, sew a bit of the soft side of the velcro to the back of your letter.Warning: I used self-adhesive velcro, but it didn't stick so I ended up sewing it on with a few stitches. If you do this too, be aware that both your needle and the remaining bit of thread will be covered in a sticky gluey mess and you can throw them out!

You've made flags! Now put them in a pile in the correct order and get out your bias tape. Start with an extra long piece of empty tape, so it will be easy to tie up the bunting. Select a wide zigzag stitch on your machine, put the beginning of the bias tape under your needle and now sew it closed for about 50 cm.

Repeat this step for all your flags: just sew a piece of empty tape, and then add another flag. Remember checking now and then to make sure your flags are all facing the same direction (I got one wrong and had to tear it loose because the letters were facing the wrong way).

Make sure you space your flags out evenly along the garland (I made the spaces on the garland roughly as wide as the flags themselves), and also make sure you're left with enough bias tape to finish (if you don't it's no problem, just sew an new piece of bias tape to the old one).

Sew another 50 cm of empty bias tape closed at the end and tadaa! It's done!